The Single Undead Moms Club (Half Moon Hollow series Book 4) (14 page)

“You put directions to your new address in the envelope, didn’t you?” Kerrianne whispered, refreshing the ice in the cooler full of sodas. “Maybe they don’t realize you moved.”

“I printed the directions in red, in all caps,” I whispered. “I can’t believe this! I can’t
believe
the other parents would pull this. I’ve seen their kids through accelerated reader testing and field trips to the freaking petting zoo and the Christmas programs—oh, my God, how many times can I loan out my dead husband’s bathrobe as a shepherd’s costume—but now, I’m trying to throw my son a freaking birthday party and they can’t be bothered to show up?”

Behind me, I heard a quick intake of breath and realized I wasn’t being nearly as quiet as I thought I was. Sure, the gasp I heard, but I didn’t pick up on his little feet shuffling across the carpet? Stupid inconsistent vampire senses.

“What do you mean, Mom? Do you mean no one is coming?” Danny asked, his lips trembling.

“No, not at all, sweetheart. I’m sure people are coming. They’re just running late,” I assured him, trying to keep the anxious note out of my voice.

“You’re sure?” Danny sniffed.

“Absolutely. There will be people here before you know it, lots of them.”

“OK.” He sighed. “Can I have a cookie while I’m waiting?”

I tried to weigh the pressures of proper parental nutrition standards versus keeping my son calm on what would no doubt be one of those traumatic birthday incidents he’d discuss in therapy ten years in the future.

“Half a cookie,” I told him.

“I’ll take it,” he said, nodding sharply and marching into the kitchen.

“Hey, does celebrating this birthday mean that you’re going to stop introducing yourself as being ‘five and five-sixths’?” I yelled after him.

“Mah-ommm.”

“I see we’ve reached the stage where I embarrass you just by having the power of speech. I have leveled up in motherhood!” I raised my hands in a semitriumphant pose until he was completely out of earshot. I dropped my arms.

Right, I would make this happen.

I turned to Kerrianne. “I need bodies. And I don’t mean in the creepy vampire way.”

Kerrianne gave me a crisp salute, and we both pulled out our cell phones and started dialing.

Once again, my friendly local
Council representative came through. Jane activated some sort of vampire phone tree, and within fifteen minutes, I had guests pouring through the front door. Kerrianne called her mother, who dropped Braylen off with the makings for s’mores and
Finding Bigfoot
on DVD. Jane and her tall, dark, and ridiculously handsome husband, Gabriel, arrived first, and Gabriel distracted Danny by asking endless Bigfoot-related questions. (Gabriel’s secret vampire power was clearly picking up on party themes.) Jane fixed me a
large
double-vodka Especially Bloody Mary, for which I would be forever grateful. I didn’t even know you could mix liquor and blood together, but you could, and it was freaking transcendent.

Jane’s human childhood friend, Zeb Lavelle, arrived with his wife, Jolene, and their twins, Janelyn and Joe. A vampire named Sam Clemson and his girlfriend, Tess, arrived with several warmers full of dessert blood from Tess’s restaurant, Southern Comforts. Iris Scanlon and her husband, Cal, brought a four-foot-tall stuffed Bigfoot with a big blue bow tied around his neck. I didn’t even know where one would find a stuffed Bigfoot, much less on last-minute notice, but Iris ran one of the most successful vampire concierge services in the Southeast, so it stood to reason she knew people who could procure weird items on the fly. I would remember that for Danny’s next birthday. Who knew what the theme would be by the time he was seven?

I hoped Danny didn’t notice that said guests were strangers and several hundred years outside the expected age range. In my desperation for guests, I’d even called Les and Marge
again
, but they didn’t pick up either of their phones.
Again
. It would be the first birthday with their grandson they’d ever missed. I would take time to feel like a horrible person when I wasn’t in such a social panic.

As much as I fretted over the birthday boy’s mood, once “Mr. Dick” arrived, Danny was so excited to be showing off his stuffed Sasquatch he couldn’t care less who else was there. The vampires stood around my parlor, talking and laughing, filling my home with joyous noise while they sipped their blood. They’d all gamely donned their “Sasquatch-hunt” outback-style bush hats and pretended to nibble at their cookies, because Danny didn’t quite grasp the whole “vampires can’t eat solids” concept.

“I hope Danny doesn’t overwhelm him,” I told Dick’s vampire wife, Andrea, as Danny used his favorite vampire as a not-quite-living jungle gym.

“He loves it,” Andrea assured me. “He missed out on his own son’s childhood years, so spending time with kids now is a sort of privilege for him. He can’t get enough time with Jolene’s twins.”

Dick Cheney had a kid. Holy hell. I would file that under questions I would ask Jane when I wasn’t surrounded by birthday-party chaos.

“When are we going to start the Sasquatch hunt, Mom?” Danny called from the couch, where he and Dick were going over the
Young People’s Guide to Cryptozoological Wonders
, a softcover volume Jane had found in her shop.

“What’s a Sasquatch hunt?” Gabriel asked out of the corner of his mouth. “And will it hurt? Because if it hurts, I say we put Dick in charge.”

I grinned at Jane’s husband and wondered what karmic debt had been owed to Jane that she’d found a partner in life who fit her personality so well. The doorbell rang, distracting me. I opened the door to find a woman in peach nurse scrubs with unruly dark hair standing in my doorway. A tall man with sandy hair and a crooked smile was standing behind her, holding a bright blue gift bag.

“Sweetheart!” Dick crowed, hitching Danny on his hip and dashing across the room so fast even my vision couldn’t track him. He handed a squealing Danny off to me while he threw his arms around the brunette, lifting her off her feet with the force of his hug. “Oh, I have missed you so much, Nola. I think you’ve grown! Are these summer visits to Ireland really necessary? Can’t ya just tell the whole McGavock clan just to move their asses to Kentucky?”

“Yes, Pops, I’ll tell my Irish family to abandon their ancestral lands and move to the land of the Yanks because you have separation anxiety,” she said, her odd lilting accent muffled by her burying her face into his shoulder.

The sandy-haired man snorted at her comment and shook Dick’s free hand. “And you saw us a week ago when we got off the plane. And three days ago. And yesterday.”

“I know, Jed, I’m making up for lost hugs,” Dick said, not relaxing his grip.

“Is that your girlfriend, Mr. Cheney?” Danny demanded, his blue eyes narrowing suspiciously at Nola. “Because I thought you were married to Miss Andrea. I like Miss Andrea. She looks like a Disney princess.”

I had mentioned my son’s ability to pick up on potentially awkward social situations and zero in on them like a hawk, yes?

For a second, Dick looked completely horrified. Nola’s head popped up from Dick’s shoulder, and she let loose a great, braying laugh. Andrea took pity on both of them and said, “Danny, honey, this is Nola. She’s Mr. Cheney’s granddaughter. Several times great-granddaughter, but we shorten it for convenience’s sake.”

Danny’s eyes tracked between Dick, who was in his mid- to late thirties, and Nola, who was
maybe
pushing the bottom of that range. “I don’t think that’s possible.”

“It is, trust me,” Dick assured him. “And I haven’t seen my lovely granddaughter for
two months
because she just
had
to go visit her family in Ireland.”

“Let it go, Pops.”

“There are some really nice rentals right here in the Hollow. They could relocate. You could get them a group rate,” he noted.

Nola’s voice was flat as she said, “Grandpa Richard.”

Dick winced and took Danny by the hand. He told him, “When she uses my proper name, that means I’m in trouble. Let’s go get you another cookie, huh, bud?”

“There are cookies?” Jed asked brightly, following them to the snack table. “Do I get a cool hat, too?”

“You brought me a present, so yes!” Danny crowed.

Nola closed her eyes and shook her head. “Give me strength.”

“The infamous Nola,” I said, stretching out my hand to shake hers. “Nice to meet you!”

Nola grinned broadly, snapping out of her prayers. “Sorry, we should have stopped in days ago, but I’ve been settling back into my work schedule at the clinic, which is always difficult after getting back to the States.”

“I’m glad to meet you. Jane said you were a nurse, but she didn’t mention the connection to Dick. I’m sure we’ll be taking advantage of proximity the next time Danny wakes up in the middle of the night throwing up.”

“Does that happen often?” she asked.

“One time, I did it off of Seth Perkins’s top bunk,” Danny boasted, running across the room and climbing up my leg. “It was
amazing
.”

“Not for the kid on the bottom bunk,” I told him, hoisting him onto my hip.

“Well, Danny, distance vomiting notwithstanding, happy birthday to you,” Nola said, extending her hand for a shake. “Thank you for inviting us. I’ve never been to a Bigfoot birthday party before,”

Danny shook her hand firmly and whispered, “It’s the perfect spot for one, and do you know why?”

“Tell me,” Nola said, grinning.

“Because there’s a Bigfoot living in the backyard.”

Nola’s dark brow winged up. “Really?”

Danny nodded. “Uh-huh, I’ve seen him out my window.”

Nola glanced up at her boyfriend and gave a sort of exasperated roll of her eyes. “You don’t say.”

“Yep. And we’re going to catch him tonight,” Danny declared. “Mom got all of the equipment.”

Nola grinned suddenly. “I’d say you have a better-than-average chance. Now, I didn’t have time to go shopping for a present, but I’d like to give you this.” She pulled a Mason jar from the blue gift bag with a flourish. An empty Mason jar.

Danny, who had been schooled thoroughly on the proper response to presents—
any
present—glanced up at me and smiled very sweetly before responding, “Thank you very much, Miss Nola. I can use it to catch lightning bugs.”

Nola offered him an approving pat on the head. “Well, what lovely manners you have, birthday boy. And it’s funny that you mention lightning bugs, because this jar contains a night-light.”

Nola put her hands over the jar and closed her eyes. She seemed to be muttering something under her breath, but even my keen vampire ears couldn’t make sense of the words. A warm, golden-green glow fluttered to life inside the jar, reflecting brightly in the blue depths of Danny’s eyes.

“Whoa,” he whispered. “What is that?”

“A
very special
night-light,” Nola told him solemnly. “Whenever you are in your room and trying to fall asleep, it will glow until you drift off. But be very careful with it. If you break the jar, it won’t work anymore.”

“How did you do that?” he asked.

“An old family trick,” she said. “Take good care of it, OK?”

He nodded, carefully cradling the jar to his chest and running up the stairs toward his room. “Yes, ma’am. Thank you!”

“How did you do that?” I asked her.

“Old family trick,” Nola repeated with a shrug. “Will you excuse me? I need to go talk to my wayward boyfriend for a moment.”

“Sure.” I watched her walk away and wondered what exactly she meant by “old family trick.” Was she a witch? A fairy? Were there other supernatural creatures out there besides vampires? It stood to reason that if we were real, there were other beasties out there, lurking in the dark. Maybe Danny’s claims to have seen Bigfoot weren’t so impossible after all.

I shuddered as the doorbell rang, and I opened it, expecting more undead revelers. Imagine my surprise to find Wade the Cranky Janitor standing at my door, cheerfully wrapped present in hand, standing behind the little boy my son had dragged around like a rag doll on school registration night.

What the hell?

My jaw dropped, and fortunately, I was left unable to say anything to hurt the little boy’s feelings. Wade’s eyes narrowed before he smirked at me. “Crazy closet lady.”

“Of course.” I saluted him. “Cranky maintenance man.”

“Charlie!” Danny cried, running across the living room and throwing his arms around his friend. “You came!”

The little boy grinned and hugged Danny. “Yeah! I’m excited! I’ve never been to a sleepover party before.”

“I’m real sorry we’re late,” Wade said. “Harley was having a problem with his inhaler, and we had to make a last-minute visit to his doctor. I didn’t want to take any chances before a sleepover. I’ve got his sleepin’ bag and stuff in the truck. I thought I’d keep ’em there for a while. Give him a chance to bow out graceful-like if he changes his mind about sleepin’ over. This is new territory for him.”

I eyed Wade carefully. What did he mean by that? Was he really concerned about his son’s big-boy face? Or did he not want his son sleeping at my house because he didn’t want to leave him in my care? He had to have known whose house he was coming to when he saw the invitation. Oddly enough, I didn’t remember filling out an invitation for a “Harley.”

“Danny, I thought you said your friend’s name was Charlie.”

“I thought it was, too,” Danny said as he helped Harley shove a straw into a chilled Capri Sun. “By the time I figured out I was wrong, I was used to calling him Charlie, so I stuck with that.”

I turned to Harley, smoothing the strawlike blond cowlick from the back of his head. “Why didn’t you correct him, hon?”

Harley shrugged and sipped his juice. “I didn’t wanna hurt his feelings.”

“You don’t have to let someone call you the wrong name to be polite, Harley.”

“Oh, OK,” Harley said, nodding his head as if this was a big revelation.

“And Danny, make an effort to call him by the correct name. How would you feel if someone called you Fanny every day?”